In the six months since she stepped out of her role as Managing Director for the UK’s Penguin Books Digital into private consulting, she has worked as a committee member both in digital strategy and in children’s work with the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA). She also chairs Culture 24, a not-for-profit company that supports cultural organizations in reaching out to audiences digitally. And she has consulted with the UK’s Parliament on digital strategies, as she has with London’s National Theatre and, currently, withGirlEffect.org.

Rafferty was in Stockholm with us late last month for Publit’s The Next Chapterconference to give the closing keynote address following my penultimate effort. It was Publit’s very capable Jonas Lennermo who had the smart idea to put us together in the executive briefing on the evening before, so I could interview Rafferty and try to tease out a specific kind of perspective that many inside publishing can’t be expected to have: hindsight.

My key question to her: Once you’re away from the center of such a major house’s needs and imperatives, how do things look? What does Rafferty know now that she didn’t know before? — or didn’t realize she knew before?